And I would say you commit the ultimate category error by likening homo-sap inter-personal behaviors to the search for, or denial of, the existence of god.
Dawkins vs. Haggard
- Thread starter ravdin
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Dawkins' attitude, words, and demeanor will chase more USAians into religion rather than away from it. Got many more pushy, supercilious Brits (or does Kenya claim him?) to offer?
Just my 2 cts.
Don't you work on Sunday? If not, maybe you should start.
I'm a grad student. I do work on Sunday.
AmateurScientist
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Your post count tends to betray your work ethic.
AS
AS
RandFan
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You lost me. Ok, I oppen myself up with that response but you have. Please to explain?
delphi_ote
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I think that quote from Haggard is beautiful. How can you get any more arrogant than persecuting people for something you do yourself?
Hmmm. Into the brairpatch, then:
From Wiki, "A category mistake, or category error is a semantic or ontological error by which a property is ascribed to a thing that could not possibly have that property."
The ontological either / or is the problem. Dawkins position does not prove god does not exist; that is one of the key axioms of his belief system, and as most of us have concluded, Truth Value unanswerable by epistemologic considerations.
Human, public, behavior is a measureable quantity or at least quality.
From Wiki, "A category mistake, or category error is a semantic or ontological error by which a property is ascribed to a thing that could not possibly have that property."
The ontological either / or is the problem. Dawkins position does not prove god does not exist; that is one of the key axioms of his belief system, and as most of us have concluded, Truth Value unanswerable by epistemologic considerations.
Human, public, behavior is a measureable quantity or at least quality.
Dawkins does not claim to have disproved god. He is very clear is stating it is impossible to do so. However, he continues his arguement by saying it is also equally impossible to disprove the existance of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Also, we all disbelieve in Thor and hundreds of other gods. An atheist is someone who disbelieves in one more god than other people.
Tony
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Dawkins' attitude, words, and demeanor will chase more USAians into religion rather than away from it. Got many more pushy, supercilious Brits (or does Kenya claim him?) to offer?
Just my 2 cts.
This is based on the assumption that Americans are as dumb as you think they are.
RandFan
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Please to explain when and how I made this error?
Yes, yes, very nice, but by saying that Dawkins' pushy attitude drives people towards religion you are committing the same "mistake" as RandFan and 'likening homo-sap inter-personal behaviors to the search for, or denial of, the existence of god.'
All the information necessary to choose to believe in the theory of evolution is already available on the internet and in the public library. Nobody needs Dawkins youtube videos to be exposed to the ideas.
I took your analogy of the 60's-70's US social sea-change to Dawkins proselytizing the denial of the existence of god as doing so. You are free to disagree with my assessment.
In a nutshell, again, epistemology does not address ontological questions, with the existence of god being at the heart of one's choice of monism. For the intellectually lazy and/or uninterested, the default choice remains dualism for the majority of Westerners sfaik.
How so?Jekyll said:
Wrong as usual. It's based on my assumption that they are a lot smarter than you think they are.Tony said:
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RandFan
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Yes, I do so disagree. My only point is the likely outcome of Dawkins efforts. You say it will lead to more Christians. I say ultimately it will lead to less because for atheists to even have a platform for their message their needs be a change in perception of non-atheists toward atheists. Primarily the misconceptions need to be peeled away. I grew up thinking atheists were Satan worshipers, immoral and criminals. This is simply not the case. The civil rights area forced people to face their ignorance and pre-held assumptions about women and minorities. We need that again only this time for atheists.
I don't for a moment think we will covert true believers into atheists. That's just not going to happen. If we can convince the current generation that atheists are not the demons they have been made out to be we can increase awareness, tolerance and eventually change the hearts and minds of future generations.
delphi_ote
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What are "groups of people misunderstood and mistreated for illogical reasons", Alex? I'll take pointless pedantic arguments unrelated to RandFan's point for $200.Ding! Category error! "women and minorities" & "atheists"